


lay down your tired & weary head my friend,

by emersen_rose



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Dead Gansey, M/M, No Smut, Post-The Raven King, The Raven King Spoilers, im so sorry, noah can see the dead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-14
Updated: 2016-05-14
Packaged: 2018-06-08 11:09:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6852271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emersen_rose/pseuds/emersen_rose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam has succeeded in life, but not in the way he wishes he had.</p>
            </blockquote>





	lay down your tired & weary head my friend,

It was a dark and stormy night.  
The wind was howling, the lightning was flashing, the rain was pouring buckets onto Adam’s leak-free roof, and he stared at the ceiling, begging Cabeswater or Mother Nature or even God to let him succumb to sleep.  
But his heart was racingandracingandracingandracingandracing because of a reason he didn’t want to admit. A reason that, if he could say it aloud, would rumble like the thunderous clouds above, rising up his esophagus in a foam of bile. A reason that Adam never thought could be reciprocated, even as he lolled his head over slowly and fluidly to stare at the form beside him.  
A shaved head, a tattoo inked in a solid black that always seemed to be changing. A tattoo it’s wearer didn’t even understand. Adam wished his dreamer was facing him, so he could stare at his long eyelashes stretching from his eyelids, his structured cheekbones, his wolfish smile and shark teeth, his complete and utter Ronan-ness.  
That was what he wanted to see, but he saw something entirely different instead. In his fluffy, comfortable white bed rested a blonde-haired woman, her name was Kimberly, and she had nice eyes. Adam lost himself in their greyness, because the color reminded him of Mr. Gray, or the Greywaren, or the color of Gansey’s skin after he sacrificed himself for the sake of Cabeswater, and the sake of Noah, who hadn’t even bothered to visit him since he moved to the bustling New York City.  
Five years. It had been five years since that third sleeper died, since he lost his raven boys, since he lost Blue and the eccentric inhabitants of 300 Fox Way. Adam felt partly to blame for the disbanding of the group, in the end, he could have stayed at a local college instead of escaping to Columbia University. He’d denied the full ride scholarship to a Virginian university, textbooks included, because it filled him with dread to stay somewhere where so many memories haunted him.  
It was September 21st, only a few days until the Saint Mark’s Eve that marked the day of Gansey’s death and Noah’s rebirth.  
He’d been invited to attend the macabre event the Ganseys were holding to honor their dead son. Adam couldn’t just not go. This was his best friend, his confidante and encourager. He’d probably be dead if not for his presence, beaten mercilessly by his father, until one day he took out the musket and-  
Adam sighed. The world really was too dark for him. And now that he lived in a showy mansion with a big bank account and piece in People magazine, he wondered if he even belonged there. Even though his beautiful fiancee had kept him grounded for so long, he wondered if he should even bring her, when it was such a depressing event, something deeply personal.  
He wondered if he loved Kimberly at all some days, as he checked the stocks on his phone, raking in hundreds of thousands on a daily basis. He would be frying eggs for her in the kitchen (“I don’t get why you need to cook! We can afford a personal chef!” she would whine as she nibbled at his overcooked eggs. Adam didn’t feel that he had to waste money on such stupid things. He could cook and clean the house on his own), and as her button nose wrinkled at the mediocrity of their lavish lives, Adam wanted to warn her that there was much worse than this.  
Adam wondered what Kimberly was dreaming about, as her face seemed to relax in sleep, her lips slowly fluttering into an unconscious smile. Was she thinking about her little sister or her Porsche or her upcoming twenty-fourth birthday, or was she thinking of how with the amount of money in her bank account, she was unstoppable?  
It was hard to tell with her, though Adam guessed the latter. He remembered when they had first met at Columbia, how quirky and intelligent she was, and how he was giddy at the fact that he won over the hottest girl in his class. Adam thought about this, and he wondered, if he hadn’t hit it big on a strategic stock purchase on Wall Street sophomore year, would she even care about him?  
Adam had everything he could ever need. Money, friends, a soon-to-be-wife, but there was a looming feeling of being alone overshadowing any euphoria. He wondered if this was how Gansey felt when he sacrificed himself, as he pondered about it many times, but there was one factor that confused Adam Parrish the most. Gansey had real friends, a real family, a real love of his life. Adam had none of that, instead he had an estranged father, an absent-minded mother, a Kimberly, and a few frat boys who only called him for advice on succeeding in the ever-so-corrupt stock market.  
Gansey shouldn’t have sacrificed himself. Adam should have. Maybe then, Ronan and Noah wouldn’t grieve so heavily, shut him out, and move on.  
Adam’s fault. It was all Adam’s fault. He could hear them think. Adam knew that was exactly what they thought, and they’d never feel otherwise. Because Adam’s eyes and hands were Cabeswater’s own, and he should have seen or felt doom coming long ago.


End file.
